DaptoFunlandGuy

I do hope they have actually enhanced it, and aren't calling a return (or substitution) of opening day effects an 'enhancement'. It is wonderful to see the fog\mist\smoke effect return and I hope the water and steam is back - look forward to hearing of what enhancements they've made!

Yes. it is possible. Is it possible they just didn't know NSW was a week later? I even asked Which in hindsight I can see you sort of mentioned at the top But it didn't directly challenge the school holiday issue (and I didn't understand your meaning) until THIS does make sense to me. I understand YOUR position now. It also addresses Dom's point if that was their intention. Yeah, Joz will probably yeet this, but hopefully i've explained where I was coming from - I can absolutely see the possibility you're referring to (now that I understand it) I just felt - by saying staggered holidays were forever - that you were ruling out the alternative presented by me and whoever started all this. Alls well that ends well, in any case. (And this is why I should have just used the quotes.) He's a Mod, not God. If we let him decide the winner in every and any discussion, you're not gonna be happy either. I'm sure, in a respectful debate, they're fine if things resolve on their own. Devolving into a dumpsterfyre from which there is no return is where they're needed.

I find that seriously doubtful. Western Sydney misses wonderland, but their economy didn't rely on it. Queensland Tourism and the Gold Coast leans hard on theme parks as part of any marketing campaign. Unless you get a boiled frog scenario, I can't see them disappearing entirely.

I mean, not sure if the park is really busy or if they've just neutered a ride with great capacity by eliminating the continuous load station and introducing individual lapbars. Like sure - health and safety reasons are fine, but the capacity loss is still a loss. (It also doesn't help to have an entire boat cycling the ride completely tagged out. I heard a boat sank in the trough the other day too.)

Yet everyone still insists that all their changed trading hours and event nights were part of the grand plan, and no 'whoopses' could possibly have occurred.

I'll spare everybody the numerous quotes, suffice to say its all there to see in the thread. So - just to repeat: A Claim that the park forgot Your reply the park has had holidays before (Implied: "they know what they are doing") Counter-Reply "other people didn't know, isn't it possible the park didn't either?" Your reply "who are these people, this has been this way forever!" Hey look! Last year was the same dates - its at least plausible some people would think this right? Your reply "Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain! The great Oz has spoken!!!

So, just to be clear, we're categorically and emphatically ruling out that Dreamworld (from the people who brought you 'in the coming weeks' and 'chain link fence-gate') didn't realise NSW had an extra week of holidays, on the basis of 'it's always been done like that' despite evidence less than a year old that proves it absolutely hasn't always been done like that? No chance. Nada. Not possible? (Also, just to add further to the doubt here, Dreamworld | Plan Your Day (archive.org) shows that on the 16th of March, the Dreamworld Website had WWW closed from 19th April (end of QLD holidays), and it now shows WWW open until 24 April Dreamworld | Plan Your Day) how else do you explain that if you claim they knew about it all along? If you go back further, Dreamworld | Plan Your Day (archive.org) on February 26th didn't even have hours published beyond 18th April - so the decision to close WWW on April 19th was made after February 26th and before 16th March, and then somewhere in the past month they reversed that to include the NSW holidays.

Admittedly, several of them didn't have kids, but I know pre-having kids I always checked holiday dates before booking to ensure I avoided those peaks - apparently some people don't. According to this government website The Easter school holiday break for 2021 spanned the following: Friday 2 April - Sunday 18 April: ACT, NSW, QLD, TAS, VIC, WA (TAS Finishes 1 day earlier, returns 2 days later) Saturday 10 April - Sunday 18 April: NT Saturday 10 April - Monday 26 April: SA Literally zero staggering down the entire Eastern states and territories. So it isn't THAT unusual.

I know a lot of people in several states that didn't realise the QLD and NSW holiday dates differed. It's not outside the realm of possibility that they also didn't realise it.

Worse yet, during the double school holiday week.

It's unusual for the ride to be removed. Usually it's just shut down and taped off. RAS don't usually allow heavy vehicle movements on the grounds overnight without move orders and authorised escorts. I'd say it'll stay closed, and sit there. Yeah look, its unfortunate, but not really anything they could control. Practically the exact same event has happened at Disneyland and Wonderland to my knowledge and i'm sure a lot of other parks too (SFMM has metal detectors at the entrance and it's not to stop you bringing in more than 100mls of liquids!) On the back of the Ride Harness story its a bad run of news, but these are isolated and unrelated stories.

While there may only be about 20 people currently discussing it in this thread, rest assured, a lot of people are noticing it. Not necessarily consciously - until you mention it to them and they go 'oh yeah! i did notice that!'. It used to be - when you'd point out the horrible state of something in Dreamworld, you'd point to a similar 'thing' at Movie World and say 'see? that's how you do it'. While the tables certainly haven't turned (DW still has a long way to go) MW is racing to the bottom fast.

^100%. It feels like a canned response and while I didn't go and check it sounded word for word like some of the GC Park statements when a ride stoppage made the news..

I think the current 'name' is "Dreamworld Wildlife" or just "Wildlife" Haven't they been doing a lot of work on the Koala viewing area recently?

Yeah this is just flat out unacceptable. RAS NSW has issued a statement this morning saying that safety systems worked as they should but I think this is more a case of good luck than anything else. My first thought is - is it possible to dispatch the ride with a harness in the unlocked position under normal operation, or only possible when operated in manual \ maintenance mode? If it is possible in normal operation, how did the ride get approval to operate in Australia? And if it is not possible, why was the operator running it in manual \ maintenance mode? On the weekend I watched a video about the Mine drop ride incident, and the similarities here are frightening (although a kids drop is probably a little less of a risk) - but at least with mine drop the seat belt was plugged in - this harness is very obviously not in the correct position.

to see that this has continued to rot without any attention except 'badly half-cover it with a hoarding' is bullshit. I suppose given the other stuff we've seen recently of abandoned audio equipment etc, this shouldn't really be a surprise. Even if the facade wall wasn't high enough, build it higher. As for view, I think Universal Singapore had a kids wheel inside the exit gift shop of Donkey Live, so view isn't super important. By all means, another more central spot (the top of the hill behind Speedys perhaps?) would be better as there would be a 'better' view of the whole land.

^A very good and fair assessment. Likewise I don't think anyone can speak as to the CEO's intentions, but I think we'd all like for him to settle in for the long haul rather than make a quick buck. (For anyone who can't wade through the Annual documents, the precise wording of the LTI is as follows:) Noteworthy is that Main Event and Theme Parks are calculated differently - with ME calculated on Equity value and Theme Parks calculated on Enterprise Value. Note also Greg Yong is now listed at 2% after assuming the role of CEO.

Surely not growing out of a whirlybird...?

^Don't forget the chainlink!

That's my take on it, yes.

What about a covered area WITH a garden? (Is this JDS Queue area, or Staff Break Room?) Source

I mean, I guess its as close as we can get to it these days... Scooby's had a 5 metre wide cargo net ramp climb. slower kids could be overtaken without getting in each other's way. A need to surround everyone with safety netting so they can keep to their feet is what results in Sky fortess - a single file version that isn't quite the same.

Alright, I'll do it. Ardent-Leisure-2021-Annual-Financial-Report.pdf (ardentleisure.com) Pages 14-18 details executive remuneration for executives. The long term incentives (LTIs) are awarded based on measurable growth and return on investment. The amounts are paid out 7 years after the grant date, or when the company sees a change of control or an IPO (theme park only). So it would seem that there are still bonus incentives payable when the park sells, but it appears that those payments will eventually pay out even if the park doesn't sell, based on business growth. My understanding of the previous LTI was it was exclusively achieved on sale of the business, and the amount was calculated based on the sell price. *I'm going off memory here, other than the 2021 report link above, so if any historic arrangements are the same \ different to what i've presented here i'm happy to be corrected - just going on what i recall.

Yeah I don't know - although the Parkz article also stated this as fact, and Rich generally states if something is speculative. The only reason I asked (I don't keep up to date on things like this) is because my recollection was Osborne's contract was pre-Weiss, and with control of the board changing, their priorities or aims may have also. Clearly the CEO's remuneration was made public at some point (I assume AGM?) so likely we will just have to wait until that happens to see if there are any changes...?

If you take a closer look at the Six Flags portfolio, you'll notice that they've got 15 current property locations, with 13 of those in the continental United States (the last two are in Canada and Mexico). (I'm not counting Hurricane Properties, but suffice to say they fit much the same pattern). Now sure, they are building a park in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia (supposed to open next year) but we don't have the oil money to pull that off. If you look at the number of parks that Six Flags have closed, or abandoned, withdrawn from or sold off over the years, you can dig a little deeper and see that they were once a much bigger (property count) operation - but it was too large to sustain. A similar fate befell Taft \ Paramount Parks - and when they restructured, the parks they didn't keep were the ones that were the furthest away from their main headquarters - like Australia. They had 8 different properties in Europe - all of which they sold off in 2004 (including the two European Movie World parks.) They also had proposed multi-gated park complexes in three different chinese regions and a Dubai park as part of the Dubai parks and resorts, all of which were cancelled in 2020 (except Dubai which was cancelled in 2019). Suffice to say - if Six Flags wants to expand, they'll take on the large populations of China well before they consider picking up a rustbucket australian park with a rocky history.